Getting Redfestive ready pt IV: the final touches

The last 48h before the Redfestive Christmas Bazaar have been a bit manic, trying to finish everything I'd set out to do. I really wanted a display that would demonstrate a variety of crafts as I'm using the stall not just to sell my wares but also to promote my craft teaching. So with the help of hubby, I've managed to make those last few bits just in time (literally!) for the fair:

Sweet little crochet hearts

Beeswax candles in natural and Christmassy colours

The Christmas cake pops were very popular, unsurprisingly so as our stall was place right by the queue to Santa's grotto ;-)

Getting Redfestive ready pt III: more Christmas cutesies

After 10 very short nights, a sewing machine working on overtime and I don't know how many stabs of the needle, I can finally see the end of the tunnel! The stock for my table at the Redfestive Christmas Bazaar this weekend is nearly ready. All I have left is a few more crochet pieces (probably little hearts) which I'll be making tonight and the beeswax candles and cake pops, which I'll make with hubby's help tomorrow.

Here are the latest additions to my stock:

A picking of Christmas apples

Little lavender lovebirds

A family of adorable little owls

Crochet snowflakes (well, it was snowing last night!)

Getting Redfestive ready pt II: the shiny stuff

I'm still making progress on my stock for the Redfestive Christmas Bazaar this Sunday. The pleasant surprise of this week was finding out that I've made enough random rings during the year to fill a small tray! But a small tray of rings just isn't enough so I've spent the past two nights raiding my stash and working on little pieces of jewellery which will make lovely Christmas gifts. And this is what I've got ready to sell:

A lovely assortment of bejewelled silk scarves

Some safety pin brooches

Assorted rings: button rings, cluster rings, rose rings

Crystal ball pendants (note: this is 4 pendants, not one necklace!)

Getting Redfestive ready

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have a table at the Redfest's Christmas bazaar on 18 December. My first Christmas fair, woohoo! I have been working hard at building a stock for the table and with less than a week to go, I'm nowhere near finished, eek! A few long days and short nights ahead, but I am confident that I will have a pretty nice little assortment of gifts ready for the fair on Sunday.

Here's a little taster of the Christmas decorations and other bits and bobs that will be up for sale:

Little felt robins, aren't they cute?

Mini Christmas stockings for the tree or for small gifts

My trademark felt baubles

Small lavender hearts

My cocktail rings are in a shop!

I am so excited to tell you that my cocktail rings are actually on sale in a real shop!

You can go and buy one of these gorgeous little beauties from Sugarlesque, a boutique on the top floor of Kingly Court, off Carnaby street in London. 

They'll make a gorgeous Xmas present for someone you love. There are ten different colourways, each in three different sizes, so you're bound to find something you like.

Watch it though, the boutique is only open until the end of this month so if you want to get your hands on one of my rings, you'd better hurry!

The cutest cactus ever!

I might have crafty fingers but they're most definitely not green. I have been known to kill even the most hardy of plants out there. So imagine my delight today when I found this little thing at a Christmas craft fair!

Yep, it's a knitted cactus! Isn't it the cutest cactus you've ever seen? At least I know I won't be able to kill it off. And it's taken pride of place on my desk because I know I'll smile every time I look at it :-)

Pretty cushions part I

Amid all the Christmas prep, I have also been making some cushions for the sleeper sofa in my hobby room. I'd hoped I could have showed you the whole set in one go but time has run out and my priority has shifted to more Christmas making rather than finishing my cushions. So here's a first look at the couple of cushions I have managed to finish.

When I visited the Knitting and Stitching Show at Ally Pally, I completely fell in love with the Sevenberry fabrics. I decided to order some and make a patchwork Union Jack out of them. As I'm pretty new to patchwork, I've completely misjudged how much fabric I'd need and I bought far too much! So I decided to carry on and make a whole set of matching, yet different cushions.

The Union Jack was quite a challenge as I had to draw the pattern on my own. Who knew there were so many pieces in a Union Jack? To get me started, I printed one on paper, measured each part and upscaled the measurements to fit a 30 x 50cm cushion. Then I drew it on a piece of pattern paper and chopped it up (sshhh, apparently this is treason!) so I could stick it on another piece of pattern paper and add the seam allowance for each part.

And then I chopped it up again (now I'll be sent to the gallows for sure!) so I could cut the fabrics.

The stitching of so many parts at so many different angles presented its own challenges but I got there in the end. The seams don't meet perfectly in one or two places but overall, I think I've done rather well!

The next cushion was inspired by the cover of a book called Stitch with Love. Luckily I had Cath Kidston's sewing book to help me sew an appliqué the simple way. And this is the result of my labour of love:

You'll have to wait until the new year now to see my other two cushion creations!

Christmas madness is upon us!

I love Christmas, I really do! I can't wait to put the tree and the decorations up, nothing would cheer me up more on these cold dark days.

But at this time of the year, being crafty is both a blessing and a curse. Yes, I love that I can make Christmas presents rather than settle for the shop bought stuff. But now that people have gotten used to getting handmade presents, I crumble a little under the weight of their expectations.

Like each year, I start the making process at the end of the summer. And like each year, I reach the end of November and have to admit defeat, I have yet again given myself too much to do and something's gotta give.

Things are particularly stressful this year because I've arranged for a small selection of my cocktail rings to be on sale in the Sugarlesque boutique in Kingly court from 1 December (there's a hint in there!) so I need to make sure I have the stock ready. And in a moment of temporary insanity, I've agreed to (wo)man a stall at the Redfest Christmas fair in Bristol on 18 December. It's a great opportunity for me to meet local people but it's a small community project and the products I will be selling will have to be at a much lower price point than my rings. That means having to create a whole new stock between now and then! What was I thinking?

This is not to say that I haven't accomplished quite a bit already. I've managed to finish all my Christmas baking last weekend, the puddings have been steamed for 8 hours and I have plenty of mincemeat waiting to be turned into pies.

I have six nephews and Santa is bringing them all a pair of felted slippers to keep their little footsies warm. I've almost finished knitting them, next I'll have to stitch them together, throw them in the washing machine to felt and then stretch on the lasts and leave to dry.

Miss Marple finds the pile of slippers very comfy indeed!

Oh, and I've managed to knit this lovely chunky snood in Patons Fab Big and learnt a new stitch in the process!

But with December now looming, I have to resign myself to the fact that that's probably as much as I'll manage this year and I'd better start hitting the shops to find the presents I still miss...

Bespoke lampshades

Ever since the Make Lounge started a class on how to make lampshades I'd been dying to make my own. Sadly our previous house didn't have any light fittings that would accommodate a lampshade. Our new Bristolian home however, does have 3 rooms which were in *desperate need* of bespoke lampshades!

I bought three kits and some fabric from the Make Lounge just before leaving London. And as soon as we had enough moving boxes unpacked to take the guilt away, hubby and I set off to make our lampshades.

The kit comes with everything you need, the metal frame, the backing panel, the tape, the tools. All you need is some basic crafting tools like scissors, a cutting mat, a ruler... It is also handy to have an extra pair of hands at the ready for some of the making process. The good thing about that is that for once, hubby and I could enjoy a crafting activity together. And yes, he truly did enjoy making our lampshades!

So here they are in their full glory:

English flowers for my hobby room

A more studious look for hubby's office

My favourite, the bedroom one

Goodbye London, hello Bristol!

In early January of 2003, I packed up my life in Belgium to move to London and never looked back.

The UK has always given me this sense of belonging that no other country ever did. When I first moved over here, London was offering me all I could have ever wanted and more. Some eight plus years later, I'm still fascinated by this wonderful city. There have been days when I have felt tired of London but all in all, I never got bored. In fact, I can honestly say I've had the best time of my life so far in London.

But life moves on, circumstances change and there comes a time when one needs to make difficult choices. For me that means it was time to leave wonderful London to start a new chapter in Bristol.

Why Bristol? Well, the West Country is without a doubt my favourite region of the UK. The landscapes are beautiful and the people are just lovely. To hubby's despair, I'm a very urban person so as idyllic as it sounds, you won't get me living in a cottage in the middle of the British countryside. Bristol is a really nice city, with a bit of life to it and still within reasonable reach of London.

What really sealed the deal for us was finding a house which has a proper shed/workshop for hubby and a hobby room for me! I've spent quite a bit of time setting up my room and I love it. In fact, I love the whole house. We're not fully unpacked yet but somehow it feels really homely.

All I'm hoping now is that Bristol will live up to my expectations. It's still early days and I still have to find my marks but so far, so good.

I'll be posting pictures of my hobby room very soon so keep checking in!

The long awaited slippers

When I first started felting, I promised hubby I'd make him a pair of felted slippers. That was about 3 years ago and he still didn't have his slippers. Other projects just kept taking priority. I tried to make up for it by buying him a pair of sheepskin slippers last year but once in a while, I'd still get reminded of my promise.

With his birthday coming up and my running out of gift ideas, I figured it was time to make him his long awaited slippers. When I made that promise years ago, I'd planned to hand felt the slippers from roving wool. But after discovering the Wash & Filz It yarn earlier this year, I decided to experiment with that instead. 

The trick with machine felting of course is that you have very little control over the felting process and thus very little control over the finished size of your creation. I found a Drops Design knitting pattern on Ravelry and I just had to trust that my wool would shrink just enough to fit hubby's feet. During felting, the wool shrinks by 30 to 40% so the pre-felting knitted slippers looked ridiculously big. Just to give you an idea, here's a couple of pics with the knitted slippers against a sheet of A4.

Once I'd finished knitting and assembling the slippers, I anxiously tossed them in the washing machine. I put them on a regular programme at 40°C. When they came out, I had a slight moment of panic as the slippers I pulled out were tiny, almost my size! But I know that felt can easily be stretched and moulded into shape while it is still wet and luckily for me, I'd bought a pair of polystyrene foot lasts in hubby's size when I made that fateful promise years ago.

After a bit of pulling and stretching, I got the slippers to just fit on the lasts (picture at the top). I left them to dry on the radiator for a day before adding a final touch. Felt on wooden floors is very slippery so it's best to add a bit of grip to the soles. I used different colours so that it would be simple to remember which is right and which is left. In time, the slippers will mould around his feet and it should be easy to tell then but in the beginning, a touch of colour will make it straightforward enough.

I am pleased to say that the slippers were an instant hit with hubby. In fact, they've become almost inseparable! And they were so easy to make, I think more of them will find their way in my Christmas gifts...

Chihuahua fever

My best friend lives far away, in Quebec to be precise. That means I don't get to see her as often as I would like to. But she's still my favourite friend and when it's her birthday, I want to make it a little bit special, in my own way.

This year I came across the Chi-Chi Fever pattern from Sublime Stitching whilst browsing in a shop and I instantly knew what I would be making for my girl. Did I mention she owns a chihuahua?




I decided to make a bag based on an Amy Butler pattern and embroider the chihuahuas on the main panels. I picked this pattern because it's a good size bag and because Amy Butler patterns are really easy to read.

Embroidering is still very new to me so I was taking a bit of a risk but it turned out all right. I didn't do any really fancy stitches just a simple split stitch along the main lines, a satin stitch on those areas I wanted to fill and then I made an attempt at French knots for the beads of the necklace.





It would have been better if I'd split the stranded cotton so the lines wouldn't look so thick. I also suspect that it would have made the detail work somewhat easier. But I didn't know at the time that you actually could/were supposed to split your thread. Practice and learn, I guess!

I really like the Amy Buttler pattern though. As expected, the instructions were clear and really easy to follow. If you use the fabrics and interfacing that she recommends, it makes for a very sturdy bag with a very professional finish.

All I needed to add was a little personal touch that would put my trademark on it and make it a wee bit more unique for the recipient.

It took longer than I thought to arrive to destination, in fact, I was starting to wonder whether it had gone lost in transit, but it's now safely in the hands of my friend and she loved it. Her husband actually thought I'd had it made! Now how flattering is that?!

Mid-season gloves

Life is pretty stressful right now. It's very busy at work and I'm about to move house... in a whole new city! Sleep has been a problem all my life but in stressful times like these, my insomnia takes a whole new dimension. That means I have a lot of extra time to occupy and I desperately need to use my hands to easy my anxiety.

I remembered seeing a knitting pattern in Making Magazine for a pair of lacy gloves. With autumn now approaching fast, a pair of gloves that's not too warm is just ideal. And I knew I had the perfect mohair-like yarn for this project in my stash so I got knitting.

The gloves are knitted on the flat and then seamed together but I think if I ever made these again, I would probably try and knit them in the round. I'm also pretty convinced that something doesn't add up in the pattern instructions for the left mitten so I went with my gut instinct and did the left mitten in my own way. It's turned out pretty well in the end! Now I can't wait wear them, they're so soft. I'm also thinking I might knit a matching scarf in the same lace pattern...

Harvest of pincushions

I think most crafters would agree that with materials costing a fair bit, you really don't want any to go to waste. So what to do with small scraps of fabric? well pincushions of course!

I came across the pattern for these fruitilicious pincushions by Heather Bailey and knew I had to make some! They're quite quick to make, only use a small amount of scrap fabric and a bit of felt and they look gorgeous.

Strawberry

Pear

For the apple and the pear, I have replaced the stem by a ribbon so that they could be hung somewhere. In fact, I think they would look quite quirky in a Christmas tree!

Apple

And if you filled them with lavender instead of stuffing, they would make rather pretty scented bags, wouldn't they?

I'm a sucker for novelty yarn

Whilst I learnt the art of knitting as a child, it's only in the last 3 years or so that I have developed a real passion for it. In that time, something has become quite obvious: I'm a complete sucker for novelty yarns!

The first garment I ever knitted was in Sirdar Ocean, a ribbon yarn. I loved working with that yarn because it's fairly forgiving and the result was so good that the cardi that was originally meant for me ended up as a gift to my mum. And when she got it, she just assumed I'd bought it until I told her I'd actually made it, that's how good it looked! For a first, I can say I was pretty chuffed with myself! This has paved the way for many experiments with novelty yarn, some more successful than others.

Rico Design has got me hooked as they release a new fun yarn pretty much every year. The first time I went to the Knitting and Stitching show at Alexandra Palace, their pompon yarn was all the rage and I have used it to make a number of Christmas gifts.

In the past couple of years, they have released the CanCan and the Loopy, both of which knit into a fun frilly scarf. You can see an example of the knitted up CanCan in the image at the top, in green on the left, and the Loopy, in pink in the middle. There are many knock offs out there but as you can see from the blue-green scarf on the right in the image above, the result isn't always as pretty!

The good thing about these yarns from Rico Design is that you only need the one ball to complete your project and you don't need to be an experienced knitter either as the whole project is in simple knit stitch, no purling required! If you were interested in starting a Rico scarf, I strongly recommend watching the video tutorials from Hulu Crafts.

Recently, my friend Jemma introduced me to another kind of novelty yarn, the Wash & Filz It from Anchor Style. It's a yarn that you knit and then throw in the washing machine for felting.

It took me a while to decide what to make from the one ball Jemma gave me but eventually I settled on a mug hug. I know completely pointless, but hey, why not?! At least I won't burn my hands on a hot mug of tea anymore :-)

Next, I plan to make a pair of slippers but first I have to figure out how big I need to knit them so that they're the right size when felted!